Iraq - 71% of Iraqis are happy

and only 10% want the US to leave. That's according to this BBC report. Yeah, I know, the BBC. Which only goes to prove that pigs can fly.

Interviewers found that 71% of those questioned said things were currently very or quite good in their personal lives, while 29% found their lives very or quite bad.

When asked whether their lives would improve in the coming year, 64% said things would be better and 12% said they expected things to be worse.

Who knew you could be this happy in a "quagmire"?

It's not just the Iraqis that feel happy, the Afghans are quite happy with thier new freedom as well.

And who made these 50 million people so happy? George Bush.

UPDATE

ABC News has more on the poll.

Surprisingly, given the insurgents' attacks on Iraqi civilians, more than six in 10 Iraqis feel very safe in their own neighborhoods, up sharply from just 40 percent in a poll in June 2004. And 61 percent say local security is good — up from 49 percent in the first ABC News poll in Iraq in February 2004.

Recently I had the pleasure of giving Robert Fisk a good fisking. Here is what Fisk had to say last week.

"Not really. Most Iraqis are just trying to survive. They have no electricity and very little money to pay for fuel. They are desperate to protect their families, womenfolk and children from being kidnapped for money."

A few minutes with Google is all I needed to debunk that nonsense. Now here's more from the poll.

Average household incomes have soared by 60 percent in the last 20 months (to $263 a month), 70 percent of Iraqis rate their own economic situation positively, and consumer goods are sweeping the country. In early 2004, 6 percent of Iraqi households had cell phones; now it's 62 percent. Ownership of satellite dishes has nearly tripled, and many more families now own air conditioners (58 percent, up from 44 percent), cars, washing machines and kitchen appliances.

Some "quagmire", heh?

Why does anyone listen to Fisk anymore?

UPDATE

I should have highlighted this from the BBC poll article.

The findings are more in line with the kind of arguments currently being deployed by US President George W Bush, he says.

Wow! Paul Reynolds said that and the BBC printed it! Amazing.
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